Strange Business Tactics Abound! - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

Strange Business Tactics Abound!

Post/Author/DateTime Post
#1
onotadaki
Aug 17, 2009 15:51:19 Hello! This post is meant to be a positive exploration and question/answering of Wizard's motivations for their very strange business practices as of late.

Here's my story:
I played D&D years ago during the 2e days and quite enjoyed myself. When I saw the direction Wizards was going with 4e, I was actually very excited that it was going to become something a little bit more accesible to my non-geek friends and family, so I went out and bought the books to get started. After running through the starter set campaign and having a good time we all made characters using the character builder (wonderful application!) and bought "The Scepter Tower of Spellgard" Module to start our campaign!

This is where I started to get really confused. See, every module created by Wizards states on the back that it is 'For use with D&D Dungeon Tiles and D&D Miniatures.' That's great, except they have stopped production of the D&D Dungeon Tiles sets?! What? This isn't a joke. The only place you can actually purchase the tilesets required to reproduce the locations in the modules is Ebay and the prices are in the hundreds of dollars for a set. Not just this, but the packaging setup for miniatures is just terrible. The random packaging of monsters may be workable if you are making the campaign from scratch and write monsters that you happen to get in the booster packs in. With a prepackaged module though, it's impossible to actually get all monsters needed from booster packs without buying $400 worth and crossing your fingers.

Now, complaining like this is completely deconstructive unless you give some kind of feedback as to how to adapt and change to improve, so here goes!

Modules require the use of the Dungeon Tiles pack, but you cannot purchase it: Wizards should re-release the Dungeon Tiles packs ASAP!

The themed tileset packs are nice, but they are all lacking doors, beds, boxes and other small room features. All of the modules released to date include things like barracks rooms and canals that cannot be modelled because the tilesets either do not include the pieces (canal) or contains only 1-2 of the items and dozens are required (beds): Possibly release a Miscellaneous pack that contains dozens of door types, beds, braziers, pews, etc...

This is covered in partial above, but deserves it's own section. One of the big features of all the currently released modules is a large foldout map of big battle areas. While really cool, they do not include ANY way to recreate the walls shown in the map previews over top of the foldout map! Direct quote from Wizards on how to set up the walls - "To do so, place barriers of some sort (D&D Dungeon Tiles work well) atop the map to represent the presence of the interior walls that run along the grid lines." First, you can't buy Dungeon Tiles, and once you do get the set, there's nothing in the kit that will recreate walls. Our group is using the garbage cut off the edges of the Dungeon Tiles set to make the walls: If Wizards wants to release maps that require the placement of walls over them, they should include the wall tiles in the stated tileset kit!

Final Thoughts:
Here's a simple solution to all these problems listed above -

Continue themed tileset packs, but release a misc. tileset pack that includes lots of small doodads like doors, boxes, braziers, etc...

Require every module to have the Dungeon Tiles set and a matching Module Tileset. The Dungeon Tiles set will include all the basic things it does now, but the matching Module Tileset will include all the extras that this specific module requires. That way, you purchase one Dungeon Tiles set and every time you get a new module, you simply purchase the tileset that corresponds to it and you're good to go!

PC Miniatures are decently packaged as it stands, but the monster booster packs are terrible if you are trying to recreate every possible monster from a larger module. While it would be rediculous to make a massive box of monsters needed per module, and it would get redundant and expensive once you moved on to other modules and had huge amounts of duplicates from previous boxes. A good direction might be to make new themed box sets by monster type.
For example:
Kobold Attack! - Box of five of each type of Kobold and 10 minions
Skeletal Nightmares! - Box of Skeleton types
etc...

This would make collecting miniatures for a campaign a little easier.

If anyone has any comments and constructive criticism I'd love to hear it This post is not meant to be some kind of flame war (I love D&D), it's just to point out some of the massive frustrations that Wizards might not have noticed. Every person i've spoken to that has run into problems like this has ended up going to another vendor, or making their own alternatives to the products that are unavailable, and that's a massive gouge in your pockets :P
#2
Seeker95
Aug 17, 2009 16:25:34
Wizards should re-release the Dungeon Tiles packs ASAP!

Despite the tiles not really being required to run the modules (we never had them for 25 of the past 31 years that I played)...

The tiles are currently in the reprint process.

Possibly release a Miscellaneous pack that contains dozens of door types, beds, braziers, pews, etc...

Although I am not sure exactly what is in them, the most recent news about tile sets includes 3-D tiles, with stairs and such. I suspect there will be accessories as well, although this remains to be seen.

The rest of your post addresses "in an ideal world" -- a world I would love to live in, too.
#3
asaris
Aug 18, 2009 6:45:02 What might work for everyone is if they had two version of the module. The first would just be the mod. The second would be a more expensive 'deluxe' version that included all of the dungeon tiles and minis you needed for the adventure. Don't know what the profit margin looks like on that second, though.
#4
zackblack
Aug 18, 2009 7:33:22
The tiles are currently in the reprint process.

Not entirely true. WotC seriously under-judged the demand for the tile sets and thus why they went OOP so quickly. What WotC is doing to fix the issue is making a non-limited edition boxed set of tiles that include most of the tiles from previous sets. The box top and bottom supposedly can even be played on.

Yes the "random selection" of miniatures baffles the mind of everyone but "collectors" but fortunately there are other solutions. Reaper Miniatures has released a pre-painted set of plastic miniatures that are not random or "limited edition". They are very nice looking AND are reasonably priced. Another option if you don't mind painting and assembling is Reaper's metal miniatures or Warhammer miniatures.

As far as large maps go most folks use a reusable map mat. Personally I buy a large pad of flipboard grid paper (about eight bux) and draw my own. It might not be as sexy but I can make up all the maps befor the game starts.
#5
JohnLynch
Aug 18, 2009 7:59:29 double post
#6
JohnLynch
Aug 18, 2009 8:01:22
What WotC is doing to fix the issue is making a non-limited edition boxed set of tiles that include most of the tiles from previous sets. The box top and bottom supposedly can even be played on

I thought they were just reprinting the original Dungeon Tile set and providing a box to put your dungeon tiles in. Link? Because either the information I got was extremely lacking or I simply misunderstood it completely
#7
zackblack
Aug 18, 2009 8:09:52
I thought they were just reprinting the original Dungeon Tile set and providing a box to put your dungeon tiles in. Link? Because either the information I got was extremely lacking or I simply misunderstood it completely

It was another thread where we were complaining about the lack of tile sets for the Dungeon Delve book (aka tile sets needed to play most of the 'delves were OOP when the book was released).

We were told that WotC has no plans to reprint the sets but an upcoming box set will include most of the tiles in the previous tile sets yadda yadda...

Where the thread is right now escapes me though...
#8
JohnLynch
Aug 18, 2009 8:34:03 Thanks Good to know my reading comprehension isn't completely lacking. I thought it odd that Dungeon Delve would limit itself to Dungeon Tiles, and then excessively use out of print ones.
#9
Hocus-Smokus
Aug 18, 2009 8:50:26 I have yet to use a single Dungeon Tile. I see them as just another money-dump, not to mention completely unneccessary. Like another poster stated, I buy the large pads of gridded presentation-board paper (30 pages per pad, 2 pads per set for $20.00 at Staples/Office Depot/etc.). That's 60 full-size (2' x 3') maps for $20.00. After tax, I'm not sure you could even buy one set of Dungeon Tiles for that. I keep all the maps I make and reuse them when possible. Minis, also, are not neccessary and a big money-dump. While I do have hundreds upon hundreds of minis (from my DDM days), it never fails that the adventure I'm running will have several monsters/NPCs/PCs that I do not have a good mini for, and I'm stuck saying "OK...this orc is really a bugbear and these aren't really goblins, they're kobolds". Any more, I just make my own using little 1" (and bigger) wooden disks ($3.99 for a pack of 50 at most hobby shops/woodworking shops), print out round tokens of the monsters on sticker-paper, slap 'em on the disks and I'm good to go. Another benefit to using the disks for monsters is conditions. I can stack as many "condition-disks" under the monster tokens as needed without making it look like the monster is walking around on a pillar or something like with regular minis.The point of this rambling is that you don't need to spend umpteen hundreds of dollars on mats/tiles/minis...there are much cheaper alternatives that deliver the same results.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 onotadaki Aug 17, 2009 15:51:19	Hello! This post is meant to be a positive exploration and question/answering of Wizard's motivations for their very strange business practices as of late. Here's my story: I played D&D years ago during the 2e days and quite enjoyed myself. When I saw the direction Wizards was going with 4e, I was actually very excited that it was going to become something a little bit more accesible to my non-geek friends and family, so I went out and bought the books to get started. After running through the starter set campaign and having a good time we all made characters using the character builder (wonderful application!) and bought "The Scepter Tower of Spellgard" Module to start our campaign! This is where I started to get really confused. See, every module created by Wizards states on the back that it is 'For use with D&D Dungeon Tiles and D&D Miniatures.' That's great, except they have stopped production of the D&D Dungeon Tiles sets?! What? This isn't a joke. The only place you can actually purchase the tilesets required to reproduce the locations in the modules is Ebay and the prices are in the hundreds of dollars for a set. Not just this, but the packaging setup for miniatures is just terrible. The random packaging of monsters may be workable if you are making the campaign from scratch and write monsters that you happen to get in the booster packs in. With a prepackaged module though, it's impossible to actually get all monsters needed from booster packs without buying $400 worth and crossing your fingers. Now, complaining like this is completely deconstructive unless you give some kind of feedback as to how to adapt and change to improve, so here goes! Modules require the use of the Dungeon Tiles pack, but you cannot purchase it: Wizards should re-release the Dungeon Tiles packs ASAP! The themed tileset packs are nice, but they are all lacking doors, beds, boxes and other small room features. All of the modules released to date include things like barracks rooms and canals that cannot be modelled because the tilesets either do not include the pieces (canal) or contains only 1-2 of the items and dozens are required (beds): Possibly release a Miscellaneous pack that contains dozens of door types, beds, braziers, pews, etc... This is covered in partial above, but deserves it's own section. One of the big features of all the currently released modules is a large foldout map of big battle areas. While really cool, they do not include ANY way to recreate the walls shown in the map previews over top of the foldout map! Direct quote from Wizards on how to set up the walls - "To do so, place barriers of some sort (D&D Dungeon Tiles work well) atop the map to represent the presence of the interior walls that run along the grid lines." First, you can't buy Dungeon Tiles, and once you do get the set, there's nothing in the kit that will recreate walls. Our group is using the garbage cut off the edges of the Dungeon Tiles set to make the walls: If Wizards wants to release maps that require the placement of walls over them, they should include the wall tiles in the stated tileset kit! Final Thoughts: Here's a simple solution to all these problems listed above - Continue themed tileset packs, but release a misc. tileset pack that includes lots of small doodads like doors, boxes, braziers, etc... Require every module to have the Dungeon Tiles set and a matching Module Tileset. The Dungeon Tiles set will include all the basic things it does now, but the matching Module Tileset will include all the extras that this specific module requires. That way, you purchase one Dungeon Tiles set and every time you get a new module, you simply purchase the tileset that corresponds to it and you're good to go! PC Miniatures are decently packaged as it stands, but the monster booster packs are terrible if you are trying to recreate every possible monster from a larger module. While it would be rediculous to make a massive box of monsters needed per module, and it would get redundant and expensive once you moved on to other modules and had huge amounts of duplicates from previous boxes. A good direction might be to make new themed box sets by monster type. For example: Kobold Attack! - Box of five of each type of Kobold and 10 minions Skeletal Nightmares! - Box of Skeleton types etc... This would make collecting miniatures for a campaign a little easier. If anyone has any comments and constructive criticism I'd love to hear it This post is not meant to be some kind of flame war (I love D&D), it's just to point out some of the massive frustrations that Wizards might not have noticed. Every person i've spoken to that has run into problems like this has ended up going to another vendor, or making their own alternatives to the products that are unavailable, and that's a massive gouge in your pockets :P
#2 Seeker95 Aug 17, 2009 16:25:34	Wizards should re-release the Dungeon Tiles packs ASAP! Despite the tiles not really being required to run the modules (we never had them for 25 of the past 31 years that I played)... The tiles are currently in the reprint process. Possibly release a Miscellaneous pack that contains dozens of door types, beds, braziers, pews, etc... Although I am not sure exactly what is in them, the most recent news about tile sets includes 3-D tiles, with stairs and such. I suspect there will be accessories as well, although this remains to be seen. The rest of your post addresses "in an ideal world" -- a world I would love to live in, too.
#3 asaris Aug 18, 2009 6:45:02	What might work for everyone is if they had two version of the module. The first would just be the mod. The second would be a more expensive 'deluxe' version that included all of the dungeon tiles and minis you needed for the adventure. Don't know what the profit margin looks like on that second, though.
#4 zackblack Aug 18, 2009 7:33:22	The tiles are currently in the reprint process. Not entirely true. WotC seriously under-judged the demand for the tile sets and thus why they went OOP so quickly. What WotC is doing to fix the issue is making a non-limited edition boxed set of tiles that include most of the tiles from previous sets. The box top and bottom supposedly can even be played on. Yes the "random selection" of miniatures baffles the mind of everyone but "collectors" but fortunately there are other solutions. Reaper Miniatures has released a pre-painted set of plastic miniatures that are not random or "limited edition". They are very nice looking AND are reasonably priced. Another option if you don't mind painting and assembling is Reaper's metal miniatures or Warhammer miniatures. As far as large maps go most folks use a reusable map mat. Personally I buy a large pad of flipboard grid paper (about eight bux) and draw my own. It might not be as sexy but I can make up all the maps befor the game starts.
#5 JohnLynch Aug 18, 2009 7:59:29	double post
#6 JohnLynch Aug 18, 2009 8:01:22	What WotC is doing to fix the issue is making a non-limited edition boxed set of tiles that include most of the tiles from previous sets. The box top and bottom supposedly can even be played on I thought they were just reprinting the original Dungeon Tile set and providing a box to put your dungeon tiles in. Link? Because either the information I got was extremely lacking or I simply misunderstood it completely
#7 zackblack Aug 18, 2009 8:09:52	I thought they were just reprinting the original Dungeon Tile set and providing a box to put your dungeon tiles in. Link? Because either the information I got was extremely lacking or I simply misunderstood it completely It was another thread where we were complaining about the lack of tile sets for the Dungeon Delve book (aka tile sets needed to play most of the 'delves were OOP when the book was released). We were told that WotC has no plans to reprint the sets but an upcoming box set will include most of the tiles in the previous tile sets yadda yadda... Where the thread is right now escapes me though...
#8 JohnLynch Aug 18, 2009 8:34:03	Thanks Good to know my reading comprehension isn't completely lacking. I thought it odd that Dungeon Delve would limit itself to Dungeon Tiles, and then excessively use out of print ones.
#9 Hocus-Smokus Aug 18, 2009 8:50:26	I have yet to use a single Dungeon Tile. I see them as just another money-dump, not to mention completely unneccessary. Like another poster stated, I buy the large pads of gridded presentation-board paper (30 pages per pad, 2 pads per set for $20.00 at Staples/Office Depot/etc.). That's 60 full-size (2' x 3') maps for $20.00. After tax, I'm not sure you could even buy one set of Dungeon Tiles for that. I keep all the maps I make and reuse them when possible. Minis, also, are not neccessary and a big money-dump. While I do have hundreds upon hundreds of minis (from my DDM days), it never fails that the adventure I'm running will have several monsters/NPCs/PCs that I do not have a good mini for, and I'm stuck saying "OK...this orc is really a bugbear and these aren't really goblins, they're kobolds". Any more, I just make my own using little 1" (and bigger) wooden disks ($3.99 for a pack of 50 at most hobby shops/woodworking shops), print out round tokens of the monsters on sticker-paper, slap 'em on the disks and I'm good to go. Another benefit to using the disks for monsters is conditions. I can stack as many "condition-disks" under the monster tokens as needed without making it look like the monster is walking around on a pillar or something like with regular minis.The point of this rambling is that you don't need to spend umpteen hundreds of dollars on mats/tiles/minis...there are much cheaper alternatives that deliver the same results.